District 9  Unamed Story  Work in progress
by ChipmunkUK
Summary: My first go at some creative fiction writing. This story will cover most of the movie, Wikus's transformation, the time spent waiting for and the eventual return of Christopher Johnson, and more. Reviews and feedback are welcome and gratefully received.
1. Chapter 1  Beginning of the end

**Disclamer**

First off, I do not own any of the existing characters or dialog, however hopefully the original characters I add won't detract from the reading experience, and I hope I can actually do this and make it believable.. Only time will tell!

This story is based on the timeline of the movie, starting about a quarter of the way through the movie and then continuing on afterward until the return of Christopher Johnson and maybe for some time after that.

There may well be large gaps in the timeline between some chapters, hopefully they won't be too jarring, and will make sense.

This story will feature multiple POVs, starting with Christopher's, and others of the "*people*" (prawns, or poleepkwa, I will use "*people*" wherever I can, and I hope it's enough, those with know-how can then replace that keyword with their name of choice).

Much of the dialog in the first 10 or so chapters will be lifted directly from the movie, but there's a lot of internal dialog, thought processes, and behind the scenes stuff not covered in the movie, which is going to be hard to write and make "*real*" to the reader. (I'm not a writer, and it's definitely going to show as you read this!)

I'm hoping that this will be a fairly long story, and hopefully it will be fun to write, and I really hope for you, the reader, to enjoy reading it.

I will certainly be taking massive liberties with the "lore" of the district 9 universe and characters, judging from what I've read, and seen while watching the movie. As of right now, I've not watched the director's commentary, which I guess I really need to do at some point.

The story will start off rated T, but might move to M as the later chapters are added, as there is a lot of violence, gore, and I maybe might even introduce some slash in later chapters. I've really not decided yet!

I may even create several diverging paths through this story, and try my hand at one of those "choose your destiny" books, where you make choices which alter the story! Wont that be fun :D (Though obviously that won't be here, as that's not allowed on this site)

Anyway, here we go. Hope this works out.. waaayyy out of my comfort zone here folks.

First chapter starts out with Christopher and his son, searching the scrapheap for "*people*" tech. Again, the first 10 or so chapters is going to be mostly pulled from the movie, don't hate me, but I need a starting place, and I think that this should work out.

Please, review and leave some feedback. Constructive or not, I think I'll probably need it if I'm to get better at doing this! :D

* * *

**Chapter 1 - Beginning of the end.  
**

The "prawn" - a demeaning human insult of a name for their race - named by humans "Christopher Johnson" flipped another useless piece of junk away, it wasn't what they needed, he - for want of a better pronoun, being asexual, and therefore sexless - was looking for any items of the "*people*"'s technology. So far he wasn't having much luck today. As with most days, especially in the last few years, their technology was getting harder and harder to come by without getting the attention of the Nigerians or MNU. Any items too small or not being weapons claimed by the Nigerian gangs or MNU was usually to be found buried in the junk littering the district, when it could be found at all.

Most of their technology had been "confiscated", most recently by MNU, them telling the "*people*" that it was for their own safety and protection. In reality, they, and similar organizations, had stolen everything they could find from the "*people*", seemingly hungering for any non-human technology - even though they would quite likely never be able to use any of it without a lot of help from the "*people*", which none would give willingly to the barbaric beings who kept the "*people*" prisoners in the district.

A fellow "*people*", named by the humans "Paul", straightened excitedly, "*Look! I found some!*" he chirped, holding up a black rectangular lump. Christopher squinted at it, it wasn't "*people*" technology, but a human cd player. "*I tell you before...*" Christopher took it from him, and scolded, "*this is human technology, it is useless.*", he waved the player at Paul "*Only our technology contains the fluid.*"

Paul pointed at the cd player in Christopher's hand, "*This is not our technology?*" asked Paul, looking crestfallen and confused, his auxiliary grasping appendages twitching uncertainly.

"*No, it's junk.*" said Christopher, and he dropped the cd player, turning away to paw through some more trash clicking "*Keep looking.*".

Today was proving as frustrating as most, over the years, they had collected as much of their technology as they could find, harvesting the fluid that powered their devices. This fluid, containing a mix of "*people*" dna, and nano-technology created by the "*people*" both powered most of their technology, and prevented other non "*people*" from using their technology against them.

Over the many many generations that the "*people*" had been amongst the stars, many hard lessons had been taught to them, chief of which was not to allow their technology to be used against themselves. Again, and again, they found that the younger species they encountered, most not as technologically advanced as the "*people*", had demonstrated how woefully unprepared, and un-ready they were for contact with the more advanced races in the galaxy at large.

Humans were no different, if anything, they were even less ready than most of the young races discovered by the "*people*". And the last 28 human years of being stuck on this dry dirt ball of a planet had driven home that point, hard!

Christopher's "son", named by the humans "Oliver", scampered towards them, holding a fat cylindrical device, it's blue glow as he held it, and the distinctive markings on it clearly labelled it as "*people*" technology. Oliver held the device out to his father trilling "*I find somthing.*".

"*Yes, this is what we need.*" he clicked to his son as he look the device and stroked Oliver's head, "*Good, little one.*", he then looked at the device in his hand. Hopefully this time, this device would contain enough of the fluid, hopefully this time, enough would be there to refine!

All three of them jumped as gunfire erupted less than a hundred feet away. The Nigerians were driving around the district again, music blaring from their truck as they fired wildly into the air with their automatic rifles and machine guns.

Christopher pulled his son to him, "*Get down.*", his son emitted a startled chirp as he was pulled to his father's side, Christopher then crouched himself, Paul doing so as well, Christopher emitted a low throbbing hum, which calmed his suddenly frightened hatchling.

Hiding behind a hill of old pc parts, trying to keep it between themselves and the Nigerians in their truck, which was swerving around one of the dusty roads, Christopher clutched the device and his son close. /*This time!*/ he thought, /*This time, there will be enough!*/, he would not miss this at all when they were finally able to leave!

In time, the truck receded into the distance, the gunfire dwindling to a muted crackling as the Nigerians moved towards their part of the district.

Slowly, carefully, the trio edged away from the trash pile, keeping a wary watch for more Nigerians on the prowl, or any MNU patrols. However, their section of the district was currently quiet, though they did see some white vehicles slowly making their way closer to their section.

More quickly now, the three walked in the direction of Paul's shack/lab. It was here that they would work on distilling and processing the all important fluid. On the way, Christopher dropped Oliver at their shack, telling the hatchling "*I will be back shortly, stay inside and play.*", before walking with Paul to his shack.

Before entering the shack, they took a careful look around, nothing was close to them, and the area was actually quiet for this time of day. Nervously, they entered the shack cum lab that they had constructed. Passing to the back of the shack, Paul pulled back a spring loaded panel separating the lab from the rest of the shack and entered.

Together the two "*people*" started the setting up and preparing the fluid distillation process, through which they would generate a concentrated version of the fluid. This more concentrated fluid was a more potent form of the nanite/dna mix, delivering much more power, however it was quite difficult to process, and required so much of the diluted fluid to produce even a small amount of the concentrate.

Paul held a funnel connected to the distillation apparatus, a lot of which would look like so much collected junk to any humans who stumbled upon it.

Christopher gingerly unscrewed the device, telling Paul "*Careful. Wait.*", the device was still humming in Christopher's grasp. He gave the ends another turn and there was a click, the humming blipped and stopped, the device came apart. "*There.*"

Clear grey fluid spilled from the device into the funnel held by Paul, draining into the apparatus, parts of which glowed with a blue light. Not for the first time, Paul complained, "*Why must it take so long?*", while a high pitched wail could be heard as the fluid made its way through the various parts of the apparatus internal workings.

"*Because it is very difficult...*" replied Christopher, the fluid crawling around the various plastic and glass tubing of the cobbled together parts on the table, "*... so much can go wrong.*".

It had taken many years of trial and error before this process had been made to work with the meagre resources they had access to, and then, sometimes it still didn't work correctly, either not working at all, or falling apart while processing the fluid, which wasted so much of the precious resource, and time.

In the end, just a single drop of the concentrate was produced this time, falling from a drip nozzle into a puddle of active nanites which sang in a lower note forming fractal patterns while they interfaced with the nanites in the drop, re-enforcing parameters, making the drop even more potent.

The end result passed out of the bottom of the red puddle, a drop of oily black ooze, which fell into a cylinder with a quiet hiss, the warning light on the side of the container blinked green and red while the cylinder integrated the newly re-programmed fero-fluid in the concentrate drop, the newly re-programmed nanites meshing and interfacing with the already programmed fluid in the cylinder. The light stopped blinking, and this time, instead of remaining green, it flashed to blue, and the cylinder closed.

It was ready! "*Twenty years of work.*" stated Christopher, this was good!

"*Our plan is ready now?*" asked Paul, excitement plain in the tone of his clicking voice and stance.


	2. Chapter 2  MNU Strikes

**Chapter 2 - MNU Strikes**

At that moment, human voices could be heard outside the shack. Christopher raised his hands, "*Quiet. Listen.*", he told Paul, while making shushing movements with his hands.

He moved around Paul towards a window in the shack, and looked out of the scratched plastic of the window. "*They are coming.*"

Outside, there were 4 humans moving closer to the shack, two of them had clipboards; one of them was speaking quite loudly to a human at its back, who was pointing a device at the two in front of him.

/*Damn*/ thought Christopher, /*Of course they would show up right now!*/ quickly moving back to the table, he gently unplugged the cylinder from the equipment on the table. "*You must hide this...*" he told Paul, waving the hand not holding the device back and forth, "*... they must not find it.*"

He handed the cylinder to Paul, "*Answer the door and be polite.*"

Paul thrust the cylinder back at Christopher, "*No! You take it.*", he was afraid and agitated, Christopher could feel the fright coming from Paul in waves.

Christopher again gave the cylinder to Paul, "*This place is crawling with MNU.*", he then backed away his hands in the air, "*I will be searched.*", he then quickly moved to the back of the shack away from the door that the humans were approaching, "*Don't make them angry. Be polite!*" as is approached another door, near the back of the shack.

Paul desperately looked around the lab, quickly coming to a decision; there was a door less cupboard near the floor, away from the back door of the shack. Inside he had a metal box, which he put the cylinder in. He then put the box back down into the cupboard, and exited the lab, wedging the spring loaded partition closed.

Christopher meanwhile quietly waited at the door to the rear of the shack as Paul made his way to the front.

*BANG* *BANG* *BANG*

"MNU agents, open the door please!" shouted one of the humans from outside.

Paul opened the door, and stuck his head outside. Quickly taking in the four humans at his door, he said the first thing to come into to mind, "*Nobody is here.*", and then quickly closed the door, waiting for them to leave.

This didn't have the expected result, instead the door was kicked in, and a large gun was pointed at the terrified "*people*". The larger of the humans which held the big gun, shouted over and over to the very frightened "*people*", "Get out!", while flicking the gun to and fro, "Get out!".

Not knowing what else to do, Paul raised his arms, and timidly stepped out of the shack, while at the rear, Christopher silently opened the other door and very slowly edged out of it, trying to be as un-noticeable as possible, he then jumped over 20 feet to the back of an adjacent shack.

As Christopher edged along the wall of this shack, the humans continued to shout and urge Paul to exit his shack, "Stoopid prawn! Move!", again the gun waved, "Get out!"

Christopher made it to the edge of the shack, peeking around the corner at the humans and Paul, /*I told him to be polite!*/ Christopher railed at himself, /*Why does he never listen to me*/, they were now making his friend kneel. "Right there, on your knees!" the large human pointing the gun at Paul shouted.

One of the clipboard toting humans then told the one with the gun "Hold 'im there, I'm going to have a look.", entering the shack with the human carrying the large device on his shoulder.

The other human with a clipboard then told the bewildered Paul "I have to serve you with an eviction notice, do you understand that?"

Paul looked at the humans now towering over hum, and shook his head, "*No.*"

Christopher could hear the humans in the shack, they were probably looking for weapons as usual, then he heard the partition spring open.

/*No! Not now!*/ Thought Christopher, they were so close, he hoped with all his strength that Paul had hidden the cylinder well.

Crashing sounds now came from the shack, and more from the lab. The humans were trashing the place. Desperate to find anything that even remotely resembled a weapon.

Then it went very quiet, he was not close enough to hear what the humans were saying, /*They found something*/ thought the worried Christopher.

Now more shouting erupted from the shack, and one of the humans sounded like it was coughing and choking, this then stopped as well, the silence lasting for many breaths.

One of the humans stuck his head from an open window frame in the side of the shack "Tomas!" he shouted, "Tomas, hold im, there's weapons 'ere! Keep the gun on 'im Tomas, there's weapons 'ere!". The human then pulled its head in.

The other human with a clipboard walked into the shack, more silence for a few more breaths.

/*Get it over with!*/ thought Christopher, /*There's nothing there!*/

Suddenly Christopher looked skyward, a loud noise was coming closer, one of the human's loud flying vehicles was approaching. Christopher now started to worry, /*Did they find something? There should be nothing there of interest...*/

One of the humans walked out of the shack, carrying a "*people*" weapon. Christopher's eyes widened, /*I told him to get rid of those!*/ and he almost let out a groaning warble, but caught himself just in time, he did not want to be caught here!

"Tomas! Look at this guy!" exclaimed the human, barely able to hold the "*people*" weapon.

The three humans then approached the large human and Paul, "Your a dealer then aye?" asked the human carrying the "*people*" weapon, gesturing with it to Paul"

"*That's not mine.*" exclaimed the now terrified "*people*".

Christopher held up a hand, making calming gestures, willing with all his might /*Be polite! Don't aggravate them!*/, hoping that Paul would not do something foolish.

The human holding the "*people*" weapon then gestured past Paul at the hovering human flying vehicle, which was coming lower to the ground, the noise actually starting to hurt Christopher's senses.

Now the humans started taunting Paul, gesturing at the approaching vehicle, "That's a hiding for you my friend, that's a hiding!"

Paul then lunged at the human pointing at gun at him, knocking the human back, causing it to drop the gun. The humans now started shouting again, telling the agitated "*people*" to stop, but Paul was now incensed, past caring what the humans said, the fight or flight instinct taking hold.

Paul then jumped to his feet, throwing the large human over his shoulder into the shack behind him, then he grabbed the "*people*" weapon from the other humans limp grip, using it as a bludgeon, swinging it at the surprised man.

Christopher watched in horror, unable to do anything to stop his friend, and unable to go to him to help, he **could not** get involved, he had the plan put into action, and his young hatchling to protect.

Paul now grasped the surprised human, who was now cradling his hurt arm, damaged from where Paul had hit him with the non functional /*people*/ weapon. Lifting the human one handed, he launched him over 15 feet into the air to come crashing against a blue plastic cubicle of human design.

There was a loud *CRACK*, something slammed into Paul's back with enough force to propel the stunned "*people*" to sprawl face down on the ground. Christopher whipped his head around, the loud human flying vehicle was landing, an armour clad human leaning out of the open door with another large human weapon pointed at Paul.

The vehicle landed, and three humans jumped out, two of them had large guns pointed at Paul's prone figure, they all started running towards the stunned /*people*/ laying face down on the ground.

Paul then started to crawl away from them, numbly moving is arms and legs, trying to get away, but his effort was in vain. The humans stopped a short distance away from the crawling /*people*/, two of them had their weapons pointed at him.

Coming closer to Paul, a bald headed human then bent over, taunting the crawling /*people*/, "Where do you think you're going? Hey? Come on.", the crawling Paul ignored it, still trying to get away.

The humans hand went to his side, and he unsheathed a pistol, "You don't run away from a chopper.", his tone was now mocking, "Where are you going?"

Paul stopped crawling, coming up to his knees, turning, with his hands in the air in front of his face, "*No. No*", he didn't want to be hurt. Now rising to his feet, he crouched in fear away from the human. Whatever madness had caused him to attack the humans, leaving as quickly as it had arrived.

The bald human then started laughing, pointing his gun directly at the now terrified "*people*"'s head. "Skeet off, brother. Skeet off.", the human then fired point blank at Paul's head.

Blood and parts of Paul's skull exploded outward, the now dying /*people*/ fell to the ground, twitching uncontrollably, blood pumping from the head wound as his circulatory system still tried to pump blood.

/*No!*/ Christopher looked on in mute horror as his friend laid dying, the humans gathered around him, laughing and joking as Paul continued to twitch. The fallen human holding his injured hand looked on as well, as if not quite believing what had just happened.

Christopher retreated back around the corner of the shack, coming to terms with the loss of his friend. He stayed still for a moment, looking lost and confused as a wave of grief washed over him, and then anger at the humans, /*Goodbye friend...*/ He took another quick look, his friend had stopped twitching, his circulatory system having finally failed after pumping a good amount of blood into a large puddle. Christopher turned away, edging along the side of the shack, he needed to leave the area or risk getting caught by these blood thirsty humans.

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Woop, there's the first two chapters.. sorry, it's woefully short, and I know my narrative probably isn't too consistent, however there will be lots more of them, and I promise, they will get better as I get used to writing again!

I'm writing these in my "off" time, and there's precious little of that these days :} hopefully updates will come every week or two.


	3. Chapter 3 Dont touch my child

**Chapter 3 – Dont touch my child**

Christopher had a hard time walking back to his shack - he wanted to hunch his shoulders and look back to make sure he wasn't being followed. Instead it took all of his self control to keep walking, slow and steady, looking like he hadn't a care in the world.

Inside he was seething with self doubt and anger. Asking himself over and over, /*Why did Paul **DO** that?*/. Paul was often headstrong, but he wasn't stupid, he shouldn't have hit the humans like he did.

Christopher rounded a corner and risked a look back at Paul's shack, the humans were still there ransacking the place, pulling weapon after weapon from the shack. It seemed that they hadn't noticed him. He pulled back, and started walking a little faster. /*I will need to go back there later.*/ he mused, /*I hope they didn't find the fuel!*/. If those humans had found it the last 20 years of work would be for nothing.

He approached his shack, no sign of his offspring. Good, that meant Oliver was obeying his order to stay inside the shack.

Christopher opened the door to his shack and stepped inside. His son turned from where he was looking at a holographic projection of this solar system, "*Look, I fix it...*" he chirped, indicating the device on the table, "*... I make it work."

Christopher looked at the device, then told his son "*I told you not to touch that.*". His son looked at him, his antennae drooping a little, "*What is wrong?*" he asked.

Christopher waved the question away, and opened the door to the shack, "*Nothing, go outside and watch for humans.". As his son walked past him out of the door, Oliver asked, "*Where is your friend?*"

"*He's gone.*", Christopher held the door until his son was outside, and then pulled it closed. Again he thought of Paul, and his death at the hands of those MNU butchers. He was angry, these humans had no right to do what they did, and the fact that they seemed to enjoy it made it all the worse.

He angrily hit the doorframe, /*Damn them!*/.

He stood for several breaths, getting himself under control, and then moved to the table with the projection device, and stood looking at it for a few breaths, his son had indeed got it going again. Christopher was immensely proud of his son, few of the "*people*" born on this planet were capable of fixing "*people*" technology, but his son seemed to soak up all he could teach, and still ask for more. He formed fists with his long fingers, he would NOT fail, his son would see the homeworld, somehow, he was sure the humans must have missed the fuel cylinder!

Christopher turned off the projection device, and placed it back in a cubby hole behind some of the PC parts that filled his shack. It would not do for the humans to come in and find that running! It would only bring more questions.

As Christopher turned from the cubby hole, he heard that same human outside talking to his son. He quickly moved to the door, and then heard the human start swearing and shouting at his son. Christopher opened the door, the large human had a gun pointed at his son, and swung it up to point at Christopher as he opened the door.

"Is this your little focking runt ere?" asked the human angrily, pointing at Oliver. His son quickly moved behind Christopher's legs, he was frightened, "*Inside, go!*" he told his son, then raised his hands palm outward in a sign of submission, "*I'm sorry, I'm sorry.*" he told the humans, this wasn't going well.

"Teach 'im some manners..." said the human, then he told the human with the gun, ".. get 'im out Thomas, get 'im out."

The large human then motioned with the gun, "Move!".

Christopher obeyed, exiting his shack, letting the door swing closed.

"Get down!" shouted the human holding the gun, "I've had enough of you stupid things!".

Christopher knelt; he hoped these humans would not just kill him out of hand like they had Paul. "*What do you want?" he asked, hoping that being polite would make these humans talk and not just start shooting.

The human with the clipboard then started to talk, "We're from MNU...", "*I know.*", ".. we require your scrawl on this eviction notification.", the clipboard was thrust into Christopher's view.

Christopher looked at the form on the clipboard through slitted eyes, an eviction? Now? This could not have come at a worse time! "*Why am I being evicted?" he asked, trying again to be polite as he quickly read the form. He could read, he had made sure he learnt the human's written language as soon as he had the opportunity. It had not been easy, as the humans didn't seem to want the "*people*" to know how to read.

"Yes, it's eviction notice.. ", said the human, either missing the question, or not wanting to answer it, ".. just put your scrawl at the bottom there, under your name. You see, there's your name at the top there." "*Yes.*", Christopher could see his human assigned name printed on the form. "You see, there's your name, Christopher Johnson, just put you name there."

Having read the form, Christopher noticed the clauses, and then told the human, "*It says you must give me 24 hours notice.*", if he could find the cylinder, he would be able to get the module hidden underneath his shack ready, and finally leave this planet, it would take several hours to ready the module to re-connect with the mothership.

The human again, didn't seem to hear or want to answer him, instead he continued talking to Christopher as if he didn't really understand what the human was saying, "Your going a nice new place, a place built especially for prawns, and we're not even going to charge you."

Christopher tried again, "*This isn't legal.*", and again, the human ignored him, "Sign the focking paper."

"*No*", Christopher should his head as he clicked that word out. He would not sign anything.

The human straightened and started talking quietly with the other humans, discussing Christopher as if he wasn't there, which was insulting. "ok, looks like we're going to have to try somthing different with this one."

The human then crouched down again, "Hello, OK, looks like we didn't understand each other properly eh?" Christopher made a non committal affirmative noise, but didn't say anything, the human continued, "So, you've got a little one there eh? Do you have a license for that little one?"

"*Yes*", Christopher quickly agreed that he did, the license had taken him over 6 months to acquire, but he had finally got the damn thing, and could then legally raise his child. The two months that his son had been illegal after he hatched had been harrowing; he had seen what happened to others who had illegal offspring.

"Well, you see there's litter out 'ere, this is dangerous conditions for your child. Article uh 75 says that because your child is living in dangerous conditions, I'm going to take 'im down to child services.", the human then stood and started to move towards the shack, "I'm going to have a little chat with 'im..."

Christopher was now extremely worried and agitated, emitting several worried clicks and chirps, he turned to follow the human, hand out stretched to stop it "*You keep away from my child!*".

The human with the gun then shouted, menacing Christopher with the gun, and the human with the clipboard angrily told Christopher "Don't you focking point your tenticles at me, damn prawn. You want to stay, you child is coming with me to child services. He's going to spend the rest of 'is life in a one by one metre box."

"Stay!" shouted the human with the gun, Christopher drooped, holding his hands up, getting shot now would not help his son.

The human with the clipboard entered the shack, he could hear it trying to call his son to him. Christopher hoped that his son would stay hidden.

The human with the large device moved to the shack, now that Christopher got a good look at it, he realised it was a camera of some description. Why was the MNU being filmed?

The human then shouted from the shack, "Thomas, keep the gun on 'im, he's definitely a criminal!", the large human stood a little taller, and pointed the gun directly at Christopher's head. Christopher sighed to himself, of course, his kind had no right to have any technology of any kind, even having a non functional cell phone usually earned a stay in an MNU holding cell for the unlucky "*people*" who happened to be found with it. "He's got a whole computer shop 'ere man!"

As the humans inside the shack moved around, he could hear the one with the clipboard talking to the one with the camera, saying that Christopher had obviously stolen the parts spread around the shack. Christopher was offended by that, he had found everything in the heaps of refuse dumped around the district by the humans, he had stolen nothing!

He then heard one of the humans coughing and retching, then the clipboard bearing human came running out of the shack, around the corner, where it immediately started regurgitating, noisily.

Christopher was curious, what had caused that reaction? There was nothing in his shack that even smelt bad! It was then that he sensed it, this human didn't smell right, no smell wasn't the right concept, something about this human was off. And it was familiar.

The human had finished retching, and came walking back to the human who still pointed a gun at Christopher. He walked past the large human towards the MNU vehicles. The large one asked, "Are we leaving him?", as he lowered the gun.

"Just focking leave 'im, we'll come back tomorrow.", replied the human who had been ill, "I'll see you tomorrow Christopher Johnson."

The humans all entered the vehicle, which then started off away from the shack.

Christopher stayed where he was knelt for several breaths, while he watched the humans leave, what had just happened? What did he just witness? And why did he feel like he just missed something vitally important!


	4. Chapter 4 20 Years of work gone!

**Capter 4 - 20 Years of work, gone?**

Christopher rose from his kneeling position as his son hesitantly asked him if he was hurt. Christopher turned and opened his arms to his son, who then took a running jump into his fathers arms. "*I am un-injured little one...*" he soothed his shaking son, stroking his son's antennae back, "*... be calm.*".

He stood, and continued watching the MNU vehicles leave, slowly clicking thoughtfully, he thought to himself, /*Something was going to happen soon.*/, he wanted no part of it. He and his son were going to be leaving soon, they just had to retrieve the fuel cylinder from Paul's shack.

"*We will be going out tonight*" he told his son, turning and walking back to into the shack, "*we must retrieve the fuel and leave.*".

His son chirped enthusiastically, "*Then we go home!*".

His father nodded, agreeing with his excited son, "*Yes little one, then we go home.*"

Christopher lowered his son to the ground, then rolled up the floor covering that hid the trapdoor in the corner of the shack. Oliver opened the trapdoor while Christopher told his son, "*Go and start a full diagnostic run of the module command systems, while that is running, we will go and retrieve the fuel.*"

As Oliver scampered down the ladder into the module, Christopher walked over to a large hap-haphazardly displayed pile of crt displays, to anyone else, it would just look like a pile of old monitors, however, they all worked, and when Christopher flicked the switch on a power strip, they crackled into life, for the most part, they were blank, having no input yet.

As Christopher watched, they started to show diagnostic information, status displays started scrolling, and system displays with wire-frame representations of the command module started to rotate on the screens. As he watched the flickering displays, he saw with some satisfaction that the repair work he and lately his son had been working on had fixed most of the failed systems.

One by one, the repaired systems were flashing up the welcome blue "OK" messages, with only one or two systems flashing up with warnings.

He looked out a window, it was still light outside, they had a few hours until darkness fell, time enough to look at some of the systems still showing warnings.

As all the the essential systems were functional, these repairs were not strictly necessary, but as the initial failures had demonstrated almost 30 years ago, systems that everybody thought failure proof could indeed fail, with disastrous repercussions!

Christopher clicked to himself, flicked off the displays, and clambered down the ladder to the module.

When he reached the bottom, his son was standing by a mound in interconnected human computers, comprising the cobbled together patches to the command systems. Although crude in comparison to "*people*" computers, they did seem to be able to handle the computational load placed upon them by the modules remaining systems, and so far, none had failed, even when power surges from the damaged sections caused the whole system to crash.

That hadn't been happening as much recently, not since most of the damaged sections had been bypassed with parts of human computers. While it wasnt going to win any design prizes, it was functioning, if it held together long enough to get home, he was confident that the homeworld would send help for the rest of the "*people*" held in virtual bondage by the humans.

* * *

Time passes, **to do : put some technobabble in here, describing the technical aspects of fixing a system of the command module. **

* * *

Having spent over an hour placing another patch into the systems, Christopher made the final connection, and stepped back, the patch looked ugly, but again, it worked. Christopher started the diagnostic running again, and climbed the ladder.

Outside it was dark, /*Come up little one, time to go out!*" he called to his son. There was a chirp below as Oliver acknowledged his father. While he waited for his son, he flicked on the monitors again, this time, the system he'd just finished repairing was showing the "OK" message. Good. Another working patch, another potential obstacle to their leaving was removed.

Oliver climbed out of the trapdoor, and pulled it shut, unrolling the floor covering to hide it. "*Ready father?*" he asked.

Christopher flicked the monitors off, and replied "*Yes, let's go.*", walking to the door of the shack. He exited, his son dancing around his legs following him outside. "*Be calm*" he admonished. Immediately, Oliver stopped scampering around, and shadowed his father as they moved away from their shack.

In the distance, they could see the fires and lights from the Nigerian section of the district, distant laughter and a smattering of gunfire could be heard, it seemed that they were content to stay there, good, he hoped that would continue for the rest of the night, they didn't need to waste time hiding from them tonight!

They approached Paul's shack cautiously, not wanting to walk into an MNU ambush, but they needn't have feared, it was quiet, no humans around. The ground where his friend had been slain was still marked by an ugly dark stain where Paul's body had pumped itself dry, he clicked mournfully, his son looking at him, "*Father?*" he clicked softly.. "*Do not worry about it little one*" he replied, "*lets get what we came for.*".

They entered the shack.

Inside the shack, they entered the lab and started their search, "*It's a silver cylinder.*" he told his son, as he pulled boxes from the piles in the room, searching in them for the cylinder.

"*I cant find it*" replied his son, who was searching the cupboards at floor level, pulling items onto the floor as he searched.

As Christopher continued to pull items from the piles left around the tab he told his son, "*We must find it. It contains the fluid.*".

"*It's not here.*" complained Oliver, now pulling items from shelves to the floor.

"*It has to be, keep looking.*" replied Christopher as he waved a torch around the room, throwing boxes away from him. He was now getting worried. Had the humans found it after all?

After 3 hours of fruitless searching, Christopher finally admitted defeat, the cylinder was gone. The humans must have taken it when they took all the "*people*" weapons.

/*Damn!*/ he thought /*That took 20 years to find!*/

"*Enough little one, we need to leave here.*" he told his son, he could hear more gunfire, and laughter from the Nigerians, he did not want to be out if they were on the prowl.

Oliver let out a distressed chirp "*Where did the cylinder go father?*" he asked, "*Did somebody take it?*". Oliver climbed up his fathers tall frame, and nestled in his arms, he was tired and frightened.

"*I do not know little one. I will ask the elders tomorrow*" he re-assured his son, not wanting to tell him that humans had probably stolen it. Maybe he could get it back!

As he walked back to his shack, carrying his sleepy hatch-ling, he thought furiously, /*Why do these humans hate us so?*/

Admittedly, some of the "*people*" had acted foolishly, behaving little better than animals, but they were mostly the labourers, the menial rank of the "*people*" who needed the guidance sorely lacking here. Those that could supply the need for guidance had been the first taken by the humans, as they had been the most intelligent. They had hoped to make the humans understand why they needed to go back to the ship.

They had been ignored, and imprisoned, those left were too few to control the workers. Christopher shook his head, antennae flicking agitatedly, this line of thought always made him angry and upset. He re-directed his thoughts to home, to the seven moons, to the beautiful landscapes, he would see them again, he was sure of it.

As he neared his shack, his son was asleep in his arms, he watched him as he walked, he was constantly amazed by his offspring, he had never thought of himself as the family type, he had never even thought of having offspring before his mate had approached him about it.

He clicked mournfully, the loss of his mate had been hard. Just before Oliver had hatched, his mate had been caught by random gunfire from the Nigerians, on one of their random joy rides around the district. He had promised to take care of Oliver when he had been asked by his mate. Then he had watched the life flee from those beautiful eyes.

He blinked rapidly, eyes stinging, that memory hurt.

He hadn't come out of his shack for over a week, until Oliver had hatched. Then he had to leave, to get food for them both.

He sighed through his gills, enough, this train of thought was going nowhere.

He entered the shack, and moved in the dark towards the part of the shack they slept in. Settling onto the dirty mattress he made a rude nest with the pieces of cardboard and rough cloth. A poor imitation of his bedding at home, it would have do to.

He would get home.. For his son.. He would get home... Christopher closed his eyes, his breathing slowed, and he slept, antennae still flicking occasionally.

* * *

Another week, another chapter, how am I doing folks, is this thing on? :D

Things will start to kick off in the next few chapters, some action is coming, lots of guns, gore, etc.. hope you are enjoying it so far!

My D9 book came from WETA this week, should give me some more ideas, shame I can't read it till I go home next month :( Oh well.


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